


Into the Valley of Death

by TheIskra



Series: Gareth Mallory Character Studies [1]
Category: James Bond (Craig movies)
Genre: Alternate Universe, Gen, Implied/Referenced Torture
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2020-08-11
Updated: 2020-08-11
Packaged: 2021-03-06 08:22:37
Rating: Mature
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,427
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/25846531
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/TheIskra/pseuds/TheIskra
Summary: Just a drabble while fleshing out my Gareth. AU - assuming Alec Trevelyan didn't die in Goldeneye and didn't turn.
Series: Gareth Mallory Character Studies [1]
Series URL: https://archiveofourown.org/series/1900219
Comments: 10
Kudos: 19





	Into the Valley of Death

**Author's Note:**

> Titled as such due to inspiration of Charge of the Light Brigade by Tennyson. M has the weight of his country, his agents, the world's safety on his shoulders.
> 
> Forward, the Light Brigade!  
> Was there a man dismay’d?  
> Not tho’ the soldier knew  
> Some one had blunder’d:  
> Theirs not to make reply,  
> Theirs not to reason why,  
> Theirs but to do and die:  
> Into the valley of Death  
> Rode the six hundred.

He presses the intercom. “Has lunch arrived?” It’s nearly four o’clock.

There’s a beat before her voice responds, “Yes, sir.”

When she enters, he glances at the silver platter, the silverware and china with a plain steak sandwich and chips sitting on top of it. She sets it down on the one corner of uncovered space. It’s absurd.

“Unless I have a visitor, there’s no needs for all of this,” he tells her, waving his hand over the platter, the china. “It’s all a bit… much.” He has hours upon hours of case files and debriefs and evaluations to absorb and quite frankly, he needs the desk space.

“Understood, sir. Tanner has left for his appointment and I’ll be leaving in a half hour. Is there anything you need before I go,” she asks. He likes her. She is unobtrusive, loyal and smart. He couldn’t have inherited a better assistant.

“No, Moneypenny, thank you,” he says, voice a little softer. He must temper his tone now, what was once considered straightforward is now often seen as curt and uncooperative. He hands over the stack of files he needed to sign. “Please ensure my calendar is blocked for the rest of the night. I’m not to be disturbed unless it’s an emergency.” “Yes sir.” He gives her a tight smile and she leaves.

When he saw the reams of paper files, of dossiers, he was irritated and overwhelmed. On one hand, he respects the need for technology and the digitizing of files but on the other, he’s got Q Branch working nonstop on a variety of firewalls and protective measures. After the last cock up, they couldn’t risk any internal documents leaking out. Not again. The agent files were not entirely surprising. He noticed a trend early on. Orphans or overachievers with fucked up estranged families. Questionable psych evaluations. The ones who were younger, who hadn’t enough field experience as a double-0 tended to be the most well-adjusted. He suspected it was due to a lack of seeing the horrific shit they’d soon be sent to handle. Moneypenny had potential. Her training was exemplary. Only during her last field mission was her weakness discovered. It was right in the front page in red. _Marksmanship failure under pressure_.

Then there was Bond. Massive gaps in service, collateral damage akin to a natural disaster, injuries that had taken out other agents and forced them into desk jobs. His head ached by the time he had gotten to the historical psych evaluations.

\- High level need for approval

\- Signifiers for propensity for violence

\- Attachment issues related to parental loss

\- Oppositional defiance

\- Flight response high

\- Excessive alcohol abuse

\- Substance abuse

\- Insomnia

\- Subject to high risk behavior

\- Avoidance as a coping mechanism

None of this was a surprise. He knew about most of this from his predecessor. The last three evaluations were marked as failed but overridden. He now knows there was no other option. When Bond is focused, he is exceptional. He would trust Bond with his life… and had even before he was in this job. The lockstep when they were at the court was instantaneous.

They didn’t discuss it after. His sense was to offer condolences and offer an extended leave. Not two days later, Bond stood in front of him ready for another mission. A _voidance as a coping mechanism_. Two hours later, he’s not touched the food that’s still sits on the corner of his desk. The last file is thick. Red files from SAS, Yellow from MI5 and the MI6 files.

“Mallory IRA Belfast May – August 1995 – 006”

He has spent years shoving down the experience and, more recently, weeks debating whether or not to pull his own file. When the Prime Minister appointed him, late in the evening after his predecessor’s death, he was told “You will have access to your personal file, but it will be reclassified as your position has changed.” It was in the first box of files delivered to his office the following day. He shoved it in a drawer and ignored it. The memories of being hit, cut, blindfolded and taken to the dank stone room fighting their way to the front of his mind. Days melting into weeks and months.

_Avoidance as a coping mechanism._

“Fuck it,” he mutters as he grabs the file and shoves it again in the drawer and reaches for the now cold sandwich. The reports from Tanner are in his inbox, appointment reminders for tomorrow’s endless meetings. He sits back in the archaic but strangely comfortable leather chair and stares at the doorframe, the red light to the right of it, the bookshelves and boxes he’s yet to deal with. He’s overwhelmed but his sense of profound duty rises above his anxiety. “Get on with it, Gareth,” he mutters to himself.

Pulling the drawer open again, he grabs the file and opens it.

_Gareth Mallory, 31M, Lieutenant Colonel for SAS captured 6th of May 1995 by Darragh Murphy of IRA. Suspected bomb maker for IRA branches in London._

_Last seen at barracks in West Belfast on 5th of May 1995._

_Embed Agent 006 with Murphy’s colleagues as fellow weapons expert. Weekly reports required. Utmost caution to be extended._

_License to kill approved._

The reports were in old telegraph style. Three to five lines each, every few days. Reports of bomb making, of location of his capture, of his mental state, his physical state. It was all so clinical. Reading of himself being written in the 3rd person was bizarre, almost as though it was someone else. But it wasn’t.

_Administered painkiller sublingual after possible broken jaw injury. No information given by Lt Col Mallory. Exceptional loyalty. Extraction planned for 27 July 1995. Prepare local agency for medical transfer to Veteran’s Hospital for extensive injuries including, but not limited to, fractured ribs, jaw, contusions to torso and limbs and broken molars at rear left of mouth. Significant weight loss and malnutrition. Known in system – fentanyl and kanna both consumed via sublingual. Recommend CBT post release to PTSD. – 006_

006\. He hadn’t thought of him directly in years.

Alec, he remembered as the man who would come in once the others were in another room, make a ruckus about how the British government were cunts, then shove his own shoulder into the bars

_“Not so tough now,” he’d say. Gareth couldn’t figure out for days what was happening. But it was a show. For them._

_“This will help with the pain,” the man would tell him every night, softly opening his mouth and putting a tablet under his tongue._

_Then soft lips on his ear. “I’ll be back tomorrow.”_

_His body was torn. The sharp pain in his mouth, his jaw, his body slowly fading along with his capacity for restraint. “Don’t leave me here,” he had said. “Please.”_

_Alec would reach back and rattle the bars again. “Oh you think your precious Queen will save you? Tell them where the launchers are and maybe we’ll let you go,” Alec says loudly, voice absolutely menacing but dissonant from the soft look in his green eyes when he spoke. “Poncy English TWAT,” he yelled before leaning in again and letting his lips drag along his earlobe. “I’ll be back in an hour. Be strong.” “He’s fucking useless,” Alec yelled, pushing the door open and slamming it closed, not looking back at him._

The sound of the intercom interrupts his thoughts.

“Security check, sir.” He presses the button.

“Clear. Thank you, Tanner. Goodnight.”

The notes about the extraction, then a ten page debrief followed. Medical records, photographs of his beaten, naked body he doesn’t remember being taken are stark in black and white. The final page is his commendation notation. The small folder behind it containing his promotion letters to the Intelligence and Security Committee and his report from the shooting at the courthouse.

Closing it, he adds it to the box with the other case files. “That’s it then,” he says to himself.

A quick search on the database tells him nothing. Alec Trevelyan – retired from active service 2010. There’s an address in London, not ten minutes from where he sits. But when he looks up the address, it’s under another name. Real estate records show it as sold the year before. It’s absurd, even diving into this. He logs out and closes his laptop, leaning back in his chair and rests his chin in his hand. He needs to go home and sleep is what he needs. The sheer weight of this job is exhausting. _Pace yourself, Gareth._


End file.
